Women’s Embodiment as Semiotic Practice:A Multimodal Analysis of Spatial Meaning in Novi Kristinawati’s Design

Women’s embodied experiences are shaped by both biological and socio-cultural dimensions of the body. In design studies, the work of women designers offers distinctive perspectives grounded in lived and bodily experience. This study examines how women’s embodiment is reflected in the architectural works of Novi Kristinawati, positioning design as a site of embodied meaning-making and socio-cultural negotiation. Using a qualitative interpretative approach, the research applies multimodal analysis informed by social body theory. Design is Southern Semiotic Review Issue 23 2026 (i) Page 419 Women’s Embodiment as Semiotic Practice: A Multimodal Analysis of Spatial Meaning in Novi Kristinawati’s Design by S. Agustin, A. Saidi, I. Damajanti, H. Ahmad understood as an assemblage of interrelated semiotic modes operating through representational, interactive, and compositional metafunctions. In-depth interviews complement the visual analysis by situating the works within experiential and contextual frameworks. The findings reveal that Kristinawati’s designs express embodiment as relational, caring, and functionally flexible, articulated through multisensory spatial strategies. These works challenge conventional notions of femininity as decorative or subordinate, demonstrating that design knowledge emerges from women’s embodied experience, where biological and social bodies are inseparable.